Install Driver for EasyCAP USB Video Capture Device in Ubuntu 10.04

EasyCAP USB Video Capture Device can be used in Ubuntu. Follow the following steps to get it working in Ubuntu Lucid Lynx 10.04. I would expect it to work on other *nix distros as well. Don’t plug-in thedevice yet, if it is plugged-in then unplug it.

Step 2: Extract the contents of the driver. To compile and build the driver modules, you would need to have your kernel sources installed, which is already installed by default for Ubuntu users. To compile the driver and test the installed drivers run the following command at a terminal:

sudo apt-get install build-essential mplayer

Step 3: Next go to the directory where you have extracted the contents of the driver and run the following command

sudo ./install.sh

Step 4: Wait for the setup to get over. Then, check that the module has been successfully loaded by doing

lsmod | grep easycap

Physically plug in the EasyCAP device, and check if the following files have been successfully created

/dev/easycap0
/dev/easysnd1

by doing this

ls /dev/easy*

Now you can plug an analog video input (VCR, camcorder etc.) and test your device with mplayer using scripts included (which should be located in the driver folder). Depending on whether you have plugged the device to S-Video input or the standard RCA / Yellow video cable, you would have to invoke one of the following commands and you should be able to see a video screen pop up using mplayer

In my case I didn’t have any issues with Ubuntu 10.04 or 10.10. Can you try reinstalling the driver again and see if that step throws out any errors? If the driver install doesn’t throw any error then I don’t see why the modules should not load.

Step 4 only generates /dev/easycap0 and not /dev/easysnd1
When I first tried test after setting it up yesterday the test only played sound and a window with no pic. Tried the test again today just for the hell of it and I’ve got picture now but it’s really choppy (dropping frames or something). Any hints as to getting smooth playback and if/when I do what software can I use to capture and edit the video?